Provisional Admissions
Provisional Admissions
Provisional Admissions Resources for Incoming Students
Provisional vs. Unconditional Admission
All applicants may be admitted either provisionally or unconditionally. Regardless of whether an applicant is admitted provisionally or unconditionally, the Decision Letter they receive in eApp is a final decision letter that can be used for obtaining a visa etc.
Descriptions of each possible admissions status are provided below.
Admit – Unconditional (A)
Unconditional admissions status indicates that all admissions requirements have been met. The student does not need to take any action regarding submitting official documents to Graduate Admissions.
Admit – Provisional (P)
Almost all applicants are admitted provisionally due to the fact that we do not require official transcripts during the application process and/or degrees may be in progress at the time of application. Provisional admissions status indicates that official documents and/or final degree conferral confirmation are still pending, and admission will be granted on the condition that the applicant provides the required materials or documents by the relevant deadline.
Deadlines for Meeting Provisional Admissions Requirements
Fall Admission: September 1st
Winter, Spring, or Summer Admission: First Day of Instruction
If provisional admissions status is not cleared by the deadline, a block may be placed on registration for any quarter during which the student remains provisionally admitted (see Provisional Admissions).
Note on deferrals:
If a student defers their admission, then the deadline for them to submit their documents moves to the quarter they’ve deferred to.
Required Documents
Student View of Required Documents
The documents that provisionally admitted students are required to submit vary based on their previous institutions attended. Fortunately, the applicants themselves do not need to determine which documents they need to submit. When Graduate Admissions processes the admit, we indicate exactly which documents the incoming student must submit (if they choose to attend UCSB) to clear their provisional admissions status. They can view this information in two places within their eApp portal:
Required Documents tab
This tab lists all the required documents the student must submit to clear their provisional admissions status. It also has instructions and resources on how to submit these official documents. If the Required Documents tab does not appear, that means the student is already Unconditional and they do not need to submit any documents.
Decision Letter
The student’s Decision Letter itself also lists the required documents within the body of the letter. As we receive documents, this section will update to reflect only the documents that we have not yet received. When all documents have been received, the admissions status will be changed to provisional and that section of text will disappear.
When the Graduate Division has determined that all of a student’s provisional admissions requirements have been met, their admissions status will be changed from Provisional Admission to Unconditional Admission in eApp and the Required Documents tab will no longer display. Once the status is changed to Unconditional, no further action is required by the student.
Department View of Provisionally Admitted Students and their Required Documents
As a department graduate advisor, we rely on your support to assist us in encouraging admitted students to submit all their required documents. Department staff can see a list of all provisionally admitted students as well as the exact documents they still need to submit within GradPoint. Just click on the Provisional Students Coming report within the Graduate Admissions Dashboard in GradPoint. You can filter by Effective Year. The text within the Provisional Notes column is the required documents the student must provide to clear their provisional admissions status. This mirrors the information they can find in their own eApp portal.
How Graduate Division Determines which Documents are Required
The Graduate Division determines which documents each admitted student must provide based on the institutions the applicant attended in the past. If an applicant attended more than one institution, they will be asked to provide more than one document (possible of differing types).
The types of documents an incoming provisional student can be asked to provide include:
Final/Official transcripts with [degree name] degree posted from [name of previous institution]
Final/Official transcripts from [name of previous institution]
Final/Official WES Document-by-Document ICAP Evaluation with [degree name] degree posted from [name of previous institution]
Completed [degree name] degree from UC SANTA BARBARA (to be verified by Graduate Division; no action is required unless contacted directly)
All State and University prerequisites outlined in the Teacher Education Program application handbook (Please submit these materials to the TEP office in accordance with their deadlines)
FINAL/OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPTS
All incoming students must send final/official transcripts from all post-secondary educational institutions attended, at which they completed one or more full academic terms (or equivalent), including community colleges, summer sessions, and extension programs. Unofficial transcripts, including those uploaded to the application, do not take the place of official documents under any circumstance. Final/official transcripts cannot have any in progress work listed as they must be final.
If an applicant earned a degree at an international institution then, instead of Final/Official transcripts, they are required to submit a WES Document-by-Document ICAP evaluation (see below). Transcripts will NOT be accepted.
If the applicant earned a degree at a U.S. institution, then the final/official transcripts must indicate that the degree was awarded. Student should wait until the degree has been posted to their official transcripts before arranging for them to be sent to the Graduate Division.
If an applicant did not earn a degree, they will still need to submit final/official transcripts. This is true for both domestic and international institutions.
How to Submit:
Students should arrange for their previous institution(s) to send their final/official transcripts to us digitally (preferred) or via mail.
If sending electronic documents, transcripts must be sent directly from the institution using their approved official transcript or document delivery service. The student should supply the document delivery service with the Graduate Division's document submissions email address: transcripts@graddiv.ucsb.edu. Electronic document delivery services approved by UC Santa Barbara include Parchment, eSCRIP-SAFE, National Student Clearinghouse (NSC), Credential Solutions, and eTranscript CA. Transcripts sent as email attachments or using cloud storage services will not be accepted.
Transcripts sent as email attachments or using cloud storage services will never be accepted as they are not considered official!
If sending paper documents by mail, official transcripts must be sent to the UC Santa Barbara Graduate Division directly from the school in the institution's sealed envelope, with all official seals and stamps intact. If we receive a mailed transcript and it appears to have been opened or tampered, it will not be accepted.
UCSB Graduate Division mailing address:
UCSB Graduate Division
Attn: Graduate Admissions
3117 Cheadle Hall
Santa Barbara, CA 93106-2070
FINAL/OFFICIAL WES DOCUMENT-BY-DOCUMENT ICAP EVALUATION
If an applicant has earned a degree(s) from an institution(s) outside of the United States, they are required to complete and submit a WES Document-by-Document ICAP evaluation that includes all their international post-secondary study (where a degree was earned).
How to Submit:
The student should visit the WES website to create their account. They will be prompted to input your academic history (please only include the institutions listed in the provisional notes), and will then be provided with a list of documents required for the completion of their evaluation.
Complete instructions can be found on our webpage: Admitted International Students | Graduate Division.
Things students should keep in mind when submitting the WES Document-by-Document ICAP evaluation:
Select Document-by-Document (DxD) and ICAP as the evaluation type. We also accept the Course-by-Course evaluation (slightly more expensive than DxD), but the evaluation must be an ICAP evaluation.
Select evaluation for the United States. WES also does evaluations for Canada, but we will not able to accept those.
Be sure coursework is finalized before sending documents to WES. You can start your evaluation, but wait until your degree(s) has been posted before sending the documents to WES.
COMPLETED DEGREE FROM UC SANTA BARBARA (no action required)
Some admitted students will see the following information on their provisional notes:
Completed [degree name] degree from UC SANTA BARBARA (to be verified by Graduate Division; no action is required unless contacted directly)
As the instructions indicate, the student does not need to take any action here. The Graduate Division will periodically check to see if the student’s reported previous UCSB degree has been awarded using internal verification methods. In almost no circumstance will a current or former UCSB student be asked to provide us with their UCSB transcripts.
These students will still receive automated email reminders until their status is cleared but, as the instructions state, no action is required unless contacted directly by Graduate Admissions.
All STATE AND UNIVERSITY PREREQUISITES OUTLINED IN THE TEP APPLICATION HANDBOOK
This provisional admissions requirement is unique to the Education - Teacher Education Program. The requirements are handled by TEP staff and Graduate Admissions will update the provisional admissions status for these students as TEP reports they have completed the requirements.
Reminders and Registration Blocks
Reminder Emails
Starting over the summer, all provisionally admitted incoming students will begin to receive reminder emails asking them to submit their provisional documents. These emails also include general information about how to register for classes and get prepared for life as a graduate student at UCSB. An example of one such email can be found here: Provisional Admission Reminder - Important Next Steps for Beginning Your Graduate Program. At least two reminder emails of this kind will be sent over the summer.
Additionally, Graduate Admissions will send some more one-off reminder emails, depending on the amount of folks who still remain in provisional admissions status throughout the summer.
Once the deadline has passed, any students who remain in provisional admissions status will receive an automated email on the 1st day of each month (for example, a student admitted to fall (deadline September 1) who is still in provisional admissions status will receive their first post-deadline automated reminder on October 1). Department GPAs will be CC’d on these emails. This recurring automated email will read as follows:
Subject: Provisional Admission Requirements – Action Required
Dear [FirstName] [LastName]:
Our records indicate your admissions status is still provisional, and the deadline for meeting your requirements has now passed. In order to clear your provisional admission, the following document(s) are required:
[Provisional_Notes]
Please have your documents sent to the Graduate Division as soon as possible. These item(s) were listed in your official Decision Letter from the Dean of the Graduate Division and in the Required Documents tab of your eApp when you were originally admitted. All required documents were due prior to the start of your first term of study at UC Santa Barbara.
Failure to clear your provisional status may result in a registration block, preventing you from enrolling in courses and/or modifying your existing course schedule. If your registration has already been blocked, you will need to meet your provisional requirements in order to remove the block.
Instructions and more information on how to submit your official documents can be found on the Admitted Applicants – What’s Next and Admitted International Students web pages. Or see the Incoming Students FAQs page for answers to many common questions about provisional admissions status.
Best regards,
Graduate Admissions and Outreach Staff
UC Santa Barbara Graduate Division
Questions? Email us.
While Graduate Admissions will be sending these emails, we also encourage the departments to follow-up with students as well. It is definitely a team effort to get students out of provisional admissions status before they begin their graduate career and we appreciate your support!
Registration Blocks
Once the deadline passes (September 1 for fall quarter, the first day of classes for all other quarters), any students who are still in provisional admissions status will receive a “soft block” (3rd pass time only) for their fall quarter registration. For this reason, we highly encourage all incoming students to register for classes during passes 1 and 2. As soon as a student submits their required documents and their admissions status changes from provisional to unconditional, we will immediately lift any registration blocks that we placed.
The following incoming students will be exempt from receiving registration blocks due to provisional admissions status:
Students who have deferred to a later quarter (their deadline has now changed to their deferral quarter so they are actually not out of compliance)
Students who only have TEP requirements remaining
5-year program students
Students who have contacted Graduate Admissions to request an extension and received an approved official extended deadline to submit their provisional documents
Extension Requests
In rare cases, Graduate Admissions staff may consider extending the deadline to submit provisional documents to a student in exceptional circumstances.
If a student thinks that an extension may be warranted, they should contact gradadmissions@graddiv.ucsb.edu. We will review their request and, if appropriate, send a link to the Extension Request Form. The student will be asked to complete it and provide supplemental documents that indicate why the transcripts/evaluation(s) will be delayed and to prove that the degree(s) was awarded. If Graduate Admissions approves of their request, the student and their department GPA will receive an email from Graduate Admissions with the new, extended deadline.
If a student does not supply their required documents by the extended deadline, then they will be considered out of compliance and a block will be placed on their registration once the extended deadline passes.
A student wishing to receive an extension must reach out before the deadline. Extension requests received after the deadline has passed will NOT be considered.
If a student is not able to register for classes prior to 3rd pass time and their registration is now blocked but the department feels there is a compelling reason that the student’s registration should be lifted so they can add classes/adjust their schedule, the department should contact Graduate Admissions directly. We will consider temporarily lifting the registration block if the student has made an effort to clear the provisional admissions status and the department believes it is important for them to be able to adjust their course schedule.
Please note: Graduate Admissions will lift all blocks that we place before 3rd week census to avoid the students from lapsing in their first quarter. If a student continues to remains provisional, a block will be placed on their winter quarter registration and it will not be lifted again until they are unconditional, without exception.